Residential Permits · Toronto
Permit drawings for Toronto houses, mostly prewar and postwar homes on narrow lots: basement suites, rear and second-storey additions, laneway and garden suites and multiplex conversions, checked against By-law 569-2013 and filed through the Online Services Portal.
What’s included
Four kinds of residential work come through our door most often. Each gets the same package: measured drawings, a zoning and code review, structural design where it is needed, and a submission we stand behind until the permit is issued. In Toronto the package goes to Toronto Building, and it is drawn to that department’s checklist.
Interior & exterior
Opening up a floor plan, removing a load-bearing wall, adding a deck or porch, putting in a pool, or taking down a tree the by-law protects.
Rental income
A basement apartment the city will approve: ceiling height, fire separation, egress, a compliant separate entrance and HVAC designed for two units.
New floor area
Rear and side additions, second storeys, detached garden suites and full custom homes, with the zoning check done before the first line is drawn.
Stamped in-house
Beams, posts, footings and framing sized and stamped by our own P.Eng, so the structural sheet sits in the same package as the architectural one.
The package
Find your situation below. If it’s there, this is the service, and the card underneath is everything you get from our one office.
07 common situations
07
items in your package, all from one P.Eng and BCIN team.
Drawn & stamped in-house
How it runs
Four steps, one team. The engineer who measures the house is the one who signs the drawings.
We walk the house, measure what exists and talk through what you want. The first consultation is free, and we tell you then which permits apply.
Before drawing, we check the lot against the zoning by-law and the plan against the Ontario Building Code, so nothing goes to the city that will bounce back.
Architectural, structural and mechanical sheets are drawn in one office, cross-checked, and stamped by our P.Eng and BCIN designers.
We file the application, track it, and answer every examiner comment at no extra charge until the permit is in your hand. If you want us to build it, the same team carries on.
Case files
Open any file for the scope, the disciplines involved, what we delivered and what the owner came away with.
A compact two-storey suite in a Toronto backyard. Architectural and structural drawings, zoning review and a framing package that makes every square foot count.
Delivered
New living space on a lot the owners already had.
Start a project like this
Structural walls came out and rooms were added to open the plan. Beam and column design, permit drawings and renovation coordination through to final inspection.
Delivered
An open layout where the load-bearing walls used to be.
Start a project like this
A code-compliant second unit with its own entrance, fire separations between the units, HVAC design and the full permit package.
Delivered
A legal second unit that brings in rent and adds property value.
Start a project like this
A new build taken from the client’s sketch to occupancy, with the architectural, structural and mechanical design done by one team.
Delivered
Built to the client’s own plan, with one team answering for every discipline.
Start a project like this
A two-storey garden suite laid out to get the most usable space from the footprint, designed and permitted as a rentable unit.
Delivered
Rental income and a higher property value.
Start a project like this
A dental office converted into a supermarket. Interior renovation, a new plumbing system and fire separations upgraded to the Ontario Fire Code.
Delivered
A dental office reopened as a supermarket, compliant with the Ontario Fire Code.
Start a project like this
A custom covered porch that turns the front of the house into usable outdoor space. Addition design and structural drawings for the permit.
Delivered
More usable outdoor space and added home value.
Start a project like this
Site grading to manage drainage and prepare the land for a new driveway, drawn as a grading plan for the site alteration permit.
Delivered
Drainage handled and the land ready for a new driveway.
Start a project like thisPhoto plates
Additions, basements, kitchens, new builds and commercial fit-outs. Drag a row to scrub through it, or open any photo full size.Tap any photo to see it full size.
21 platesResidential, commercial & new build
The drawing set
Framing schedules, wall assemblies, dimensions and a city review stamp, as issued. Client title blocks are trimmed off to protect the people we drew them for.
Drawing set
Sheets in this set
Sheet title
Existing basement plan
The existing house recorded before any design: beams, joists and bearing walls.
Drawing no.
2 of 5
Service area
From the office we cover the whole GTA, north to Barrie and Orillia, east to Peterborough and Cobourg, west to Kitchener and Brantford, and down through Niagara.
46 across 8 regions
York Region
Toronto & Peel
Halton
Durham
Simcoe & Dufferin
Waterloo, Wellington & Brant
Hamilton, Niagara & Haldimand
Kawarthas & Northumberland
Past the 90-minute line
We've also completed projects in London and Strathroy. Farther out than that? Call (416) 990-9179 and ask.
Permits filed with municipalities including
Before you call
Anything we haven’t answered here, we’ll answer on a call. The first consultation is free.
(416) 990-9179We make them, at no extra charge. Comments from the examiner at Toronto Building come to us, and we revise the sheets, reply to each point and resubmit until the permit is issued.
Any project that fills, changes the grade or builds anything on a lot inside a TRCA Regulated Area. An addition, a garden suite, a new house or a pool there all need a TRCA permit, and TRCA requires a pre-submission consultation before the application goes in. On a Toronto lot we check the regulated-area maps against the survey before the site plan is drawn, then prepare the authority’s application from the same drawings as the permit set.
Yes. The City of Toronto accepts building permit applications online through its Online Services Portal, and online submission is mandatory for certain building permit types. Permit status can be searched on the City’s Building Permit Application & Inspection Status site. We file online whether or not the permit type requires it, and check the status site as the review moves.
Yes. We take on residential permits across Toronto, including North York and Scarborough, about half an hour from our Richmond Hill office. The first consultation is free, by phone or on site.
Three things to start: property address; what you want to do, in your own words; and a survey of the lot, if you have one. Send those and we tell you what Toronto Building will ask for before we quote.
Probably, but it is worth checking before anything is drawn. Most Toronto properties come under By-law 569-2013, while some, including lots in North York and Etobicoke, are still zoned under the by-law of their former municipality, and Toronto Building’s zoning review uses whichever one governs the address. We confirm it at the start and take the setbacks, height and coverage from that by-law, so the zoning certificate and the permit drawings describe the same house.
They can, wherever the work comes near a private tree 30 centimetres or more across or any City street tree, because Chapter 813 needs a permit to injure a protected tree as well as to remove it. A footing, a side entrance or a wider driveway can reach into the roots, so we plot those trees on the site plan from the survey and tell you, before the set goes to Toronto Building, whether a tree permit is needed too.
It changes what has to be settled first. Inside one of Toronto’s Part V districts, which also take in the Cabbagetown districts, Harbord Village and Rosedale South and North, we find out what the district asks of exterior work such as a new porch, a second storey or changes to the street face before the elevations are drawn. The set then goes to Toronto Building for the usual zoning review and plans examination.
The application, the Zoning Applicable Law Certificate and whatever forms Toronto Building’s guide asks for with that kind of work, all uploaded through the Online Services Portal. Drawings by a qualified designer carry the designer’s name, registration number and BCIN, a signature and a statement that the designer has reviewed the design and taken responsibility for it. Sheets sealed by our P.Eng also go in with an Assumption of Responsibility for Engineering Content form.
Toronto Building’s guidance allows it if you have the drafting skills and know the Building Code. If not, the drawings have to come from a qualified designer, meaning someone who holds a BCIN or a licensed architect or engineer. Either way they are filed through the Online Services Portal and examined against By-law 569-2013 or the lot’s former by-law, and a sketch you have already made is a good starting point for us.
Searched & answered
Short answers to the residential permits questions people search most, and the broader topics they lead to.
Not covered here? Book a free consultationAsk Toronto Building’s Records Disclosure Service. If you do not have a copy of your permit drawings, you can request them there, and the City’s disclosure policy gives anyone access to residential building plans for permit applications submitted after December 31, 2006. Fine Engineering uses an old set as a reference and still measures the house before drawing anything new.
It stays open until every required inspection is done and the permit is closed, and Toronto Building lists open permits as a cause of delays when selling a home and of trouble getting new permits. A permit more than 18 months old with no inspections requested draws a Notice of Intention to Revoke. Fine Engineering prepares any drawings an open permit still needs before it can be closed.
A permit to cut a new exterior door into a basement, usually with a stairwell dug beside the house. It covers the structural opening in the foundation wall, the guard and drainage for the stairwell, and the fire and egress rules for the unit it serves. Fine Engineering designs separate entrances as part of legal basement packages across the GTA.
Not always. Architectural drawings show a design. Permit drawings are the version an examiner can check against zoning and the Building Code, with dimensions, construction details and engineering where the work needs it. A concept plan is a useful start, and the code detail goes in before it is filed. Fine Engineering draws permit sets from its own site measurements.
Drawings of the house as it stands, the proposed floor plans, elevations and sections, and a site plan showing setbacks and lot coverage. Structural drawings come in where the work touches the structure, and HVAC, plumbing or electrical sheets where the scope needs them. Fine Engineering prepares the whole set with the completed application form and files both with the municipality.
Ontario qualifies designers in these Building Code categories: House; Small Buildings; Large Buildings; Complex Buildings; Building Structural; HVAC House; Plumbing House; Plumbing All Buildings; Building Services; Detection, Lighting and Power; Fire Protection; and Onsite Sewage Systems. The province’s QuARTS public registry lists each designer with their categories. Fine Engineering’s engineer holds BCIN qualifications in Small Buildings and in structural and HVAC design, alongside a P.Eng licence.
Good to know
In Toronto the reviewer is Toronto Building. Every Toronto lot sets its own terms: its zoning and any demolition or grading approval the work needs decide which sheets go into the permit set.
We walk the site with the survey, usually within a day or two of the call, before anything is drawn, then file the residential permits package to Toronto Building’s own checklist.
The housing in Toronto is prewar and postwar houses on narrow lots across the inner suburbs, with most recent growth in mid- and high-rise apartments. On a narrow lot the side yards leave little room, so a side entrance, a rear addition or a second storey is checked against the setbacks before it is drawn.
Toronto allows multiplexes of up to four units across the city, and up to six in the Toronto & East York District and Ward 23. Converting an existing house means drawing the whole building rather than one unit: the zoning check, the fire separations and exits between units, and the structure, heating and plumbing for each unit go to Toronto Building as one coordinated set.
In Toronto the starting point is usually a prewar or postwar house on a narrow lot, so we measure it before the unit layout is fixed. The side yards decide whether a second entrance fits, and the position of the existing stair often decides where the exits can go.
A house on a Toronto ravine lot can need three approvals: a Chapter 658 permit for fill, grade changes or trees inside the ravine and natural feature protection area, a TRCA permit where the lot is also in a Regulated Area, and the building permit itself. The TRCA permit has to be issued before Toronto Building can issue the building permit.
We check the lot against both sets of mapping when the survey comes in. The site plan, grading and tree protection are then drawn once, and the same sheets go to Urban Forestry, to TRCA and to Toronto Building.
Contact us
Tell us what you’re planning at home and we’ll tell you which permits apply, on a free first call.
First consultation free(416) 990-9179